The Briggs familyThe estate of William and Lois Briggs, seen here in a photograph from around 1940, has given $8 million to University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Chidlren's Hospital.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The estate of a longtime Beachwood resident has left $8 million gift to University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital.

The gift, from the late Lois Ralls Briggs, a Shaker Heights native who died in 2009 at age 92, is being used to establish two new endowed chairs in neonatology, and the William and Lois Briggs Fund for Discovery in Neonatology.

The couple had no children.

Mr. Briggs, who died in 1976, had served as president of Pressure Casting Inc. in Euclid, a company owned by his wife's family.

"She was the last of her line," said a nephew, Andrew Briggs, of Geneva, Indiana. "She wanted to leave her legacy."

Mrs. Briggs' relationship with UH Rainbow began in the 1980s after taking a tour of the hospital's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

In her 90s when she died, she had made UH Rainbow the principal beneficiary of her estate. The $8 million gift is through the William & Lois Briggs Funds of the Cleveland Foundation.

"If she wanted to do something, she did it," Briggs said of his aunt, whom he described as a very generous, but very private person. "I don’t think anybody knew about [the gift]."

UHDr. Michele Walsh

The two endowed chairs and discovery fund is supporting the work of UH Rainbow neonatologists by paying for clinical research and training future leaders in the field. The $5 million endowed research fund will provide annual seed money for promising projects and clinical innovations as well as supplement ongoing clinical research at UH Rainbow.

Earlier this year, Dr. Michele Walsh, UH Rainbow's Chief of Division of Neonatology, was named the first holder of the William and Lois Briggs Chair in Neonatology. Walsh also is professor of pediatrics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and the principal investigator for the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Neonatal Research Network. She and also leads the Cuyahoga County site of the NICHD National Children’s Study.

In 2009 UH opened the $26 million Quentin & Elisabeth Alexander Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, which treats more than 1,200 babies each year.

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